Replacing substrate...

[kweckstrom]

Ok, so I started my tank with Crushed Coral in my Nano-cube.

 

My tank finished cycling about a week ago, and the cleanup crew has been happy as heck. After seeing several other tanks in person from various places, I discovered that I hate the way crushed coral looks as a substrate and want to replace it with sand (like Pink Fiji).

 

I want to replace the substrate, but I don't want to kill my cleaning crew.

 

My local fish store has "live sand" in bags (I forget the brand). From what I gather, this sand may be "live" in a bacterial sense, but won't have any real hitch-hikers/pods in it or anything like that. Not sure if that's a good thing or bad thing.

 

They also have Fiji pink non-live sand that I really like.

 

How would you guys go about doing a substrate swap? I'm really afraid of killing my cleanup crew thanks to a brand new cycle.

 

Am I S-O-L?

[caja]

I did that myself just after cycling my first tank. Hated the crushed coral that the LFS talked me into. Put all the LR in a bucket of tankwater and remove the clean-up crew either to the same bucket of tankwater or a separate container.

 

Remove the crushed coral and give the tank a rinse to clean it out. Add the new substrate, LR and about 1/2 the tankwater. Just mix up a new batch of SW to top off the rest. Try and keep the tanks params the same as the holding container with the critters. You'll have to reacclimate for a bit. Be sure to run an HOB with some floss as the new substrate may cause some clouding.

[kweckstrom]

Any particular reason I don't want to use ALL the original tankwater? I plan on doing this all in one sweep that hopefully won't take more than an hour

 

-Karl

[caja]

Well, you could, but you are going to stir things up in there when removing stuff, so it would be nice to have some freshly mixed SW for that. Besides, instant WC.

[kweckstrom]

I suppose... Maybe i'll just move OUT of this cube and move into a 20H that doesn't make my eyes bug out when I look into it like this cube does sometimes.

 

*sigh*

[bneyman]

I did the same with my eclipse 12, but I had the CC in my tank for 5 months before I finally made the switch. I got exactly what you mentioned, some "dead" fiji pink, simply leaving a cup or so of my CC in the bottom to "seed" it. At first I was concerned about loosing my substrate's pod/critter population, but now, 4 months later, I've got tons of pods, some small bristleworms, and I sure there are numerous other critters I can't see or haven't discovered yet.

I'll NEVER use CC again, the fiji pink looks SO much better than CC.

When I made the switch, I removed about 1/2 of the water, placed my LR and the hermits in a bucket with some of the water I removed from the tank, and went to work scooping the CC out. Then, I poured the sand in the tank, spread the pile out underwater as best I could, piled my LR and hermits back in, and VOILA! You now have a sand bed!

You WILL have a sandstorm/milkshake tank for a few days, but it will settle, just takes some time for the filters to remove the stuff that wouldn't settle and restore the clarity of the water. I was then able to see to re-arrange my aqauascape back the way it was before the switch. And I did this all with a skunk cleaner and tomato clown in the tank. They were kinda freaked out for a couple days as the water cleared, but they are much happier now and are perfectly fine.

HTH...